


Father/Daughter Reunion

by princessbekker



Series: Family!Verse [1]
Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Gen, Reunion, Sonny and Nick get married, Wedding, Zara is a teenager and Nick has no custody of her, estranged family, family!verse, implied nick/sonny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-03-02 11:28:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18809977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessbekker/pseuds/princessbekker
Summary: Nick's daughter shows up to his wedding.





	Father/Daughter Reunion

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of my family!verse on tumblr, but can be read as a stand alone! basically, Zara is like 16 ish and Maria has sole custody of her in California.

The last time Olivia saw Nick this happy, it must’ve been before Maria and Zara left. He’s been better lately, especially with Sonny, and helping out with Noah, but he really hasn’t been himself in a long time. She says so in her speech, holding up a glass of wine and trying to keep tears out of her eyes, something he barely managed at her own wedding so long ago. There’s a real smile on his face, one that reaches his eyes.

Afterwards, Nick hugs her tightly. “I wish I could fix things with her,” he admits, not for the first time. “She should be here. I think she’d really like Sonny.”

Zara. He sent his daughter an invite, but she never answered a yes or no, the same way she never answers his birthday or Christmas cards, the same way she refuses to talk to him when he calls her mother. Leading up to today, he held onto this hope that she’d arrive, or at least text him a congratulations, but the sun has set and still, the venue is nothing but Sonny’s guests, Nick’s mother and sister, and a handful of old friends from Narcotics or SVU. His daughter isn’t among them.

“Maybe, but you shouldn’t focus on that right now. This is your night.”

Olivia kisses the side of his head and lets Nick cling to her for a moment longer while he sorts himself out, puts all his broken little pieces back where they belong inside his chest so he doesn’t fall apart at his own wedding. The shards will poke out again soon, and Sonny will help him and Olivia fix it. Right now, he just needs a bandaid. And Olivia can give him that.

By the time he pulls away, his eyes are still glassy, but not the obvious remnants of tears. No one should notice, and the pictures won’t memorialize his sorrow. His gaze skates over Olivia’s shoulder to find Sonny, and once he does, he offers her one last sad smile before drifting over to his husband. They really do make each other so happy. It’s what they both deserve, both need, and she’s so happy they’ve found each other.

Olivia goes to find Alex, or Nick’s mother, but someone taps her on the back before she can. She turns around, and comes face to face with a young girl. A teenager, maybe. At first, she figures it’s one of Carisi’s nieces or cousins, but no. Her skin is darker, and so is her curly hair. She’s familiar in the sort of way it takes Olivia a moment to recognize. The girl has Nick’s eyes, and she looks strikingly like the photograph hung up in Nick and Sonny’s apartment, only a good decade older.

“Zara?”

The girl- Zara- nods and crosses her arms over her chest protectively. Nick does the same when he’s anxious, provided he’s not wearing a collared shirt or vest he can pull on restlessly. “You’re Olivia, right? His old lieutenant?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I talk to you?”

Olivia nods and gestures toward a less packed table in one of the corners, where they hopefully won’t be bothered by anyone for a while. She genuinely hasn’t seen Zara at the wedding before this, no one has, which is almost as strange as the fact that she’s here in New York instead of in California with her mother. The skirt of her dark purple dress is modest, but a shiny and flaring out in a layer of tulle. A party dress. Something she might have worn for the quinces that Maria never threw her.

When she sits, Zara smooths down her skirt, wipes her under eyes for stray makeup, and fixes her hair. She really is just like her father, not that she knows it. They haven’t talked in so long. On the one attempt Nick made to see her- her fifth grade promotion- she and Maria made it clear that neither wanted anything to do with him, and they’d be more than willing to have local law enforcement remind him that he hasn’t even been awarded visitation because of his record. 

“How come he has time for this?” Zara asks.

“Time for what?”

She waves a hand flippantly at the festivities. “For his husband. For a wedding. He never had time for my mom and me.”

There are a lot of reasons, mainly Nick staying with SVu and his subsequent forced retirement. Even though he’s been off the force and in recovery for a few years, he still needs a cane sometimes for his knee. He needs it tonight, but refused to have it here, at his wedding. Zara doesn’t know about that, though. She didn’t even pick up the phone when Nick’s mother called her to say her father might not make it out of surgery after Johnny D shot him.

“He’s changed a lot,” Olivia answers, because it’s easier. “You know, he really misses you.”

“No. He just sends cards because he feels guilty, same with the invitation. I know he doesn’t actually want me here, and my mom said-”

Olivia takes one of Zara’s shaking hands in her own. “Sweetie, I promise, your father really does love and miss you. And just between you and me, he was really upset that he didn’t see you here. He wants to fix things, and I know he’s really sorry for not being there for you.”

Those words sink in slowly, the way paper drifts down from a high building, or water soaks into a long dried sponge. Zara smooths down her skirt again, and again, and once more before she stands up, a bit unsteady in her heels. She’s not the same little girl who bounded excitedly into the precinct with a picture for her father she made at school, but someone closer to a young woman and afraid that her own family does not love her anymore. 

“Let’s go see him, okay? I promise, he wants you here.”

Still holding Zara’s hand as a pillar of support, she leads her through the crowd of women cooing Italian at a tired Noah and amused Alex, past a couple of detectives sharing a story about something crazy Nick did on the job, and so many people until she spots Nick and Sonny. They’re talking to one of Sonny’s sisters, who’s clearly had a couple too many, poking Nick’s chest and clearly pretending to threaten an amused and unafraid Nick. Again, it strikes Olivia how happy he looks.

“Nick,” she calls.

His face washes smoother, softer, when he sees her. Sonny’s sister excuses herself for the couple to come forward, both a little confused by the teenager at Olivia’s side until Nick recognizes her. One hand goes straight to his mouth, the other digging into Sonny’s arm. He isn’t just glassy-eyed, but crying now, full blown, his shoulders shaking.

Zara looks up at Olivia, then back to her father. “I wanted to say congrats. On getting married.” She looks to Sonny then, sizing him up. It’s such a familiarly protective look that Olivia’s chest tightens. “Nice to meet you. I’m Nick’s daughter, Zara.”

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr is the same as my AO3 user!


End file.
